Sleater-Kinney : American rock at its best
Women should be plaintive singer-songwriters or interpreting folk , like Laura Marling doing a Joni.
They should be quirky Kate Bush follow-ups with non-existent groups , like Marina and the Diamonds.
They should be backing singers to the true greats like Cohen, or soul merchants or girl-group teenyboppers.....
This was certainly the feeling I had from watching the annual pop and rock awards on S4C, where the only women in evidence (apart from one member of Candelas) were handing out the gongs to run-of-the-mill male rock bands.
In a recent 'Guardian' article John Harris blamed the general demise of contemporary music on this and cited Fleetwood Mac as a unique band where male and female interactions created fascinating movements between harmony and tension.
While I do prefer the Peter Green manifestation of that particular group, his point is highly pertinent.
The main reason why Arcade Fire's first album 'Funeral' was, by some distance, their most interesting wasn't just their intriguing lyrics and intensity , it was very much the vocal dueting, duelling, and harmonising of Win Butler and Regine Chassagne.
As the latter has moved into the background, so they have lost what made them.
Here in Cymru we are blessed with two bands where women contribute so much.
Milford Haven's Paper Aeroplanes are actually reminiscent of Fleetwood Mac, and Sarah Howells's vocals favourably compared to Stevie Nicks.
On cds like the recent 'Joy' she has many layers of voices, while live her voice is much more intimate and direct.
If they're the mellower and sadder side of rock, then Y Wyddcrug's finest, The Joy Formidable, reflect the crags and slate of Eryri itself.
Though they have moved to London, they still need to appear on Jools talking in Jamie Oliver Mockney.....oh, and a sex-change for Rhiannon 'Ritzy' Bryan would be useful as well!
Ritzy is a great guitarist as well as powerful vocalist, but they can vary their sound, as shown on the latest album 'Wolf's Law'.
The title track is actually hidden after 'Forest Serenade' and many might miss it, yet both these songs illustrate how the band are much more than crashing chords and the album as a whole has a lot of animal and natural imagery, which gives it a unity most rock albums do not possess nowadays.
Recently, even Jools Holland reflected the importance of women in rock with the appearance of two American bands on his series ( Wales still waits!).
The exotically named Kanene Denehey Pipkin may be the second vocalist of Brooklyn's The Lone Bellow, but she's one of the main songwriters and is fundamental to their overall sound, especially on the rousing choruses.
Though more alt. folk than rock, they're a band who capture what Arcade Fire once possessed : a passion for melodies which lift you to lightning skies.
Portland Oregon's Sleater-Kinney are a different matter altogether. A rock band who were around in the 1990s, they have re-emerged with a music which is raw and angular and less obvious than earlier material. The guitar playing of Carrie Brownstein summons up the great Marc Ribot (of Beefheart and Tom Waits fame) with its constant twisting and turning.
Latest album 'No Cities To Love' is one of the best rock albums of the last decade and the main vocalist Corin Tucker has all the visceral power of Maggie Bell or Patti Smith. Even better, their politics are feminist and left-leaning , yet never carried heavily in the words.
Like The Joy Formidable and Paper Aeroplanes, I doubt they'll be topping festival bills this summer.
The rock scene has become too tedious and Harris is right to argue that its all-male dominance is a major factor.
These bands have so much more to offer.
INT GOT NO BALLS!
Women in rock
is like chess in pubs,
or rugby without goin
on-a piss before'and.
Women do b'long in-a crowd
or angin 'bout backstage.
When it comes t playin
they should stick t folk,
or teeny-bop stuff
or soul ballads, dressed up :
a Gemma Page in Led Zep,
cun yew imagine tha?
Le's face it, women
int got no balls!
Rock's a mewsical boxin bout :
they cun scream, but carn shout.
RSS Feed
